Tag Archives: Clemson

CFP: Clemson’s QB versus Bama’s Defense?

It all comes down to this: #1 Clemson vs #2 Alabama to decide college football’s national champion. Kickoff is at 8:30 pm Eastern on January 11 from University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale. The game will be televised on ESPN.

The Kickoff Editor Tommy Duff expects a good game, although “I’m not really sure what to expect from Clemson at this point because it’s very difficult to get a read on just how they match up.”

The knock on Clemson was that they had not played anyone of note that jumped out, he said, but that was before the Tigers convincingly beat #4 Oklahoma 37-17 in the Orange Bowl to extend their win streak to 17 in a row, tied for the second-longest streak in ACC history.

“Oklahoma was an eye opener, so I could go with what the numbers say, which would be Bama, but I’m not that confident in the numbers because I think Clemson is as talented as anyone in the SEC at this point,” Duff said.

The game could be summarized as Alabama’s front seven versus Deshaun Watson.

“Mobile quarterbacks have been more successful against Bama’s defense, and Clemson has the best mobile QB in the nation. It comes down to the battle in the trenches, Alabama’s defensive line against Clemson’s offensive line. They have to neutralize Watson’s ability to improvise with his legs, both his scrambling ability as well as his ability to complete passes outside the pocket.”

The Crimson Tide shut out #3 Michigan State 38-0 in the Cotton Bowl. Their sole loss was in week three against an Ole Miss team that ended the year ranked #12 with a 10-3 record, losing to Florida, Memphis and Arkansas.

The Tide – picked as a 7-point favorite by Vegas — will seek to dominate Watson and Clemson with the best passing defense in the country. Alabama claims 15 national titles, Clemson’s only title came in 1981 under Danny Ford. It’s a new day, though, under Dabo Sweeney as the Tigers have won 10 games in five straight seasons and prepare to take on Sweeney’s alma mater.

Back in August, The Kickoff picked Ohio State and TCU as our top two teams, but we had Alabama ranked #4 and Clemson ranked #10. We predicted Watson would be one of 2015’s breakout players, along with eventual Heisman winner Derrick Henry, who is sure to be unleashed once again. In the preseason, Vegas had Clemson ranked at #20, while the Coaches’ Poll had the Tigers coming in at #12.

Our 2015 Kickoff All-American first and second teams included Watson and Henry, as well as Alabama’s Ryan Kelly, A’Shawn Robinson, Reggie Ragland, and Eddie Jackson, as well as Clemson’s Jordan Leggett and Shaq Lawson.

There are some parallels between the FBS and FCS championship games this week. The Crimson Tide isn’t the only team from the state of Alabama looking for a trophy. Jacksonville State is playing North Dakota State in the FCS national title game Saturday. And like Nick Saban’s squad, NDSU goes into its game with a reputation for reloading each year with the nation’s best players. This is the fifth straight appearance by the Bison.

JSU Quarterback Eli Jenkins has run for 13 touchdowns and passed for 19 with 2,484 passing yards and 1,030 yards rushing. Running back Troymaine Pope has also shattered records. For North Dakota State, Quarterback and potential first round draft pick Caron Wentz goes into the game with experience, having won the last four NCAA FCS Championships, and fellow Quarterback Easton Stick has kept NDSU in the hunt after injuries to Wentz. The Gamecocks beat Sam Houston 62-10 on Dec. 19 to advance to the final. The Bison defeated Richmond 33-7.

The Kickoff has followed JSU and NDSU throughout the year in our Select Division I FCS Schedule listings. In week 2, pre-season #3 ranked Auburn barely survived an overtime clash with the Gamecocks (JSU’s only regular season loss) while NDSU’s only losses were to Montana and South Dakota. JSU has made the FCS playoffs three straight years, but hasn’t advanced past the second round since 2013 when they fell in the quarterfinals – a win Saturday would be their first FCS title.

The FCS Championship game will kickoff at noon eastern at Toyota Stadium in Frisco, Texas. The game will air on ESPN2.

The final issue of The Kickoff this season will include Bowl recaps with final records.

We will publish six monthly issues during the Off Season (February-July). We will look at recruiting, preseason injury reports, breakout players, Heisman hopefuls, and break down the Top 10 high school prospects by position so you know what needs the top teams are hoping to fill. We predict which prospects have the potential to be future stars, elevate programs, or at least contribute right away. Just as we show you the future high school and JUCO stars in the making, the Kickoff reports on which players won’t be around to help their teams in the fall. We also enhance your enjoyment of NFL games by letting you know where your favorite college players may end up in the fall.

Let’s Go Bowling

In this week’s issue of The Kickoff, we list all of the major bowls scheduled between now and the VCFP National Championship Game on January 11. We’ve also listed the 2015 College Football Award Winners.

After the end of the regular season, our Top 25 is topped by Clemson, still undefeated at 13-0 and set to play our #3 Oklahoma in the Capitol One Orange Bowl CFP Semifinal at 4 pm on New Year’s Eve. Alabama in second place is set to play our #4 pick, Michigan State, in the Goodyear Cotton Bowl at 8 pm on New Year’s Eve. The winners of those games will meet up on January 11 at 8:30 pm in Glendale, AZ.

At this stage, our Power Ratings give Clemson the edge over Oklahoma and Alabama over Michigan State. It will be interesting to see which two teams survive elimination. Those who do not like one conference dominating the country should like seeing teams from the ACC, SEC, Big 12, and Big 10 all found in the Playoff finals. The SEC still leads the nation with 14 teams winning 102 games or a winning percentage of 0.604. The PAC-12 follows with 12 teams with 84 wins.

This year is perhaps most notable because of the sheer volume of teams playing beyond the regular season. We’ll see nine teams from the ACC, eight from the AAC, six from Mid-American, six from MT West, 10 from the Big 10, 10 from the SEC, nine from the PAC12, seven from the Big 12, five from Conference USA, and four from the Sun Belt in post-season play.

“This number of teams in bowls should make a lot of fans happy and really pleases the coaches because it means many more practice days for teams going to bowls,” said Bert Caldwell, one of the owners of The Kickoff. “Like a mini-spring practice.”

Some have questioned whether teams with losing records should make bowl appearances. Minnesota, for example, has a record of 5-7, yet it will play the 7-5 Central Michigan Chippewas in the Dec. 28 Quick Lane Bowl. Two teams from the same conference, Nevada (6-6) and Colorado State (7-5), are playing each other in the Nova Home Loans Arizona Bowl on Dec. 29. Auburn, which began the season picked by many to be in the College Football Playoff finals right now, finished their season 6-6 and will play a 9-3 Memphis team that is favored in the Birmingham Bowl on Dec. 30.

In the latest issue of The Kickoff, we include our Pre-Bowl Kickoff Power Ratings, as well as the 2015 Kickoff All American Team and a listing of bowl game payouts by event.

It’s been a huge year for Alabama’s Derrick Henry, who was named recipient of the Heisman, Maxwell, Walter Camp, and Doak Walker awards. We list all of the major college football award winners in the latest issue of The Kickoff. Henry was deemed by Vegas to have a 16/1 chance of winning the Heisman (compared to 10/1 for Jeremy Johnson who didn’t even play every game as a starter). Trevone Boykin, the presumed frontrunner back in July, did not win any of the major awards. Clemson’s Dabo Swinney won the Home Depot Coach of the Year award for taking his team to 13-0.

Speaking of coaches, last week we looked at the coaching carousel. Bowling Green, Brigham Young, East Carolina, La-Monroe, and Tulane are all searching for new coaches while other teams must replace coordinators who’ve moved up the ladder. Alabama has hired Jeremy Pruitt away from Georgia after Mark Richt’s move to Miami and Kirby Smart coming in as the Bulldogs’ new coach. We’ll see the ripple effects from the changes being made well into spring practice and beyond.

If you subscribe to The Kickoff, you have a powerful resource at your fingertips for making your weekly picks. To order our new Basketball newsletter, The Tipoff, call us at (423) 267-0953.

If football is still more your bag, you can get the jump on 2016 with The Kickoff’s Earlybird Special for the holidays. For that relative who can’t get enough of the game, you can buy him (or her) an annual email/PDF subscription, which includes six pre-season issues and 17 weekly issues next fall – and you’ll get an email/PDF version for yourself or someone else at no additional charge! The cost is just $28 for 23 printed issues in the Email/PDF version.

“The 65th anniversary for The Kickoff has been the most successful in our tenure so far,” said editor Tommy Duff. “It means so much to be able to share each college football season with each and every one of our readers. We strive to make the best improvements each year to enhance their Saturdays in the fall and look forward to spending 2016 with them.”

Week 3 Preview: An Infamous Rivalry Revived and an SEC Showdown

It’s already Week 3 of the College Football season with some great games ahead this weekend. The Kickoff Games of the Week are Georgia Tech at Notre Dame and Ole Miss at Alabama.

The Yellow Jackets enter the game ranked at No. 9 on the Kickoff Top 25 this week, jumping two spots from last week. The Fighting Irish, right behind them on our rankings, lead the series 27-6-1, including a 15-3 record when hosting. The teams are meeting as part of a deal with the Notre Dame and the Atlantic Coast Conference. This has been a heated rivalry over the years with Tech fans pelting visiting fans with fish during the sixties and seventies, as portrayed in the movie Rudy. Their last meeting was in 2007. It will be fun watching them battle it out again.

After beating Wisconsin and MTSU, the Crimson Tide (ranked No. 3) continues to look strong as they enter Conference play against the Rebels, who won their last two games 76-3 and 73-21 versus Tennessee Martin and Fresno State, earning a No. 15 rating on our Top 25. Without about 3.2 points difference on our Power Ratings, we expect Alabama to win this one. The Tide has history on their side, leading the series 24-1 when hosting Ole Miss and 48-8-2 overall since 1907. Ole Miss QB Chad Kelley was one of our superlatives for his performance last week as he went 19-24 for 360 yards and four touchdowns.

Bama’s bitter rival, Auburn, tumbled 10 spots in our Top 25 after struggling to beat FCS opponent Jacksonville State in overtime at home last weekend. We were as guilty as anyone for buying into the pre-season hype about the Tigers and Quarterback Jeremy Johnson as Playoff and Heisman contenders. Saturday’s game in Baton Rouge was supposed to be one of the better games all year, but we expect LSU (now ahead of Auburn on our Top 25 at No. 11) to have vengeance on their minds after seeing Auburn’s struggles so far and remembering the 41-7 loss last year in Jordan-Hare. Whether it’s a close game depends on if Auburn took last week’s humiliating near-loss as a wakeup call. Will Muschamp will have to figure out how to stop Leonard Fournette, who had 28 carries last week for 159 yards and three touchdowns.

No. 1 Ohio State should have no problem putting away Northern Illinois. Same with our No. 2, TCU, as they host SMU. Michigan State jumped 3 spots in our Top 25 to No. 4 after upsetting Oregon, which fell from No. 6 to No. 16 (the Spartans play Air Force while the Ducks will take out their frustration on Georgia State). Baylor remains at No. 5, followed by USC, Georgia, and Clemson (who play Rice, Stanford, South Carolina, and Louisville respectively). Louisville, by the way, is 0-2 for the first time since 1998 after being upset by Houston 34-31 last week.

Tennessee dropped out of the Kickoff Top 25 while Oklahoma jumped from No. 21 to No. 17; the Sooners showed a lot of determination last week in a hostile environment, beating the Vols 31-24. Last week’s No. 16, Boise State, also leaves the Top 25 after losing to No. 18 BYU 35-24. The same can be said for last week’s No. 22 Arkansas, now 1-1; the Razorbacks were expected to be much better than Toledo. Texas A&M joins the Top 25 at No. 21 after defeating Ball State 56-23 while Arizona State enters at No. 25 after beating Cal Poly 35-21.

In this week’s issue, we shared the Conference Breakdown through week three, ranking on home attendance last season, the largest attendance increases from 2013-14, the Football Bowl Subdivision Standings, the Football Championship Series standings, our Kickoff Playoff Seeds (including the first four projected out), our Power Ratings for this week’s games, and the schedules and results for every FBS team (and select Division I FCS schools).

For a limited time, we’ve extended our special so that when you buy one First Class or PDF subscription to The Kickoff, you can get one FREE PDF subscription to give a friend. If you are a business owner looking for a great way to keep yourself in front of your customers, check out our business subscriptions at https://thekickoffstore.com/subscriptions/business/

Also, test your knowledge of college football by participating in our Thursday Throwdown questions. We’ll see whether we can stump you (using Google to look up the answer is like under-inflating a ball to win a playoff game, but we don’t have access to your search history – thank goodness for that!)

Talk to us this weekend while we watch the games. Which upsets are you expecting? How is your team doing so far this year? Sound off! Use the hashtag #thekickoff on Facebook and Twitter so we can follow your conversations.